The cost of a fast answer
2026-06-12 — Speed is a virtue in execution and a liability in judgement, and the same meeting usually asks for both.
A founder sends a deck on a Tuesday and wants a view by Friday. The useful reply is not the fast one. The fast one is a summary of the deck read back with more confidence than the reading supports.
What we try to do instead is separate the two questions that arrive welded together: is this a market we want to be in, and is this a company we would back today. The first can be answered quickly and changes slowly. The second cannot be answered quickly and changes constantly. Answering them in the order they were asked is how a firm ends up with a thesis it cannot defend and a portfolio it cannot explain.
The cost of the slower answer is real, and it is paid in deals we do not see. We have decided that is cheaper than the alternative, which is being the investor who was quick and wrong in a way that took three years to notice.